Working Our way North, 2000 mile mark reached - Days 210 - 222

April 10-22
Day 210-222

This post covers multiple days while we worked our way north toward home.

We waited out the high winds in Beaufort, SC for a few days before making our way north to Charleston.  I wish we could have waited out the cold!  I wound up navigating from inside the cabin because it was just too cold on the flybridge. While in Charleston, we met our nephew Kevin McCaig who had just relocated to Charleston for his job.  We took him to the world famous Jestines Kitchen for dinner to introduce him to Lowcountry cooking.  Of course, we forgot to take any pictures with Kevin.  We decided to wait out a day for wind and found an excellent Thai restaurant for lunch on King Street called Tasty Thai & Sushi.

We decided to leave Charleston for Georgetown, SC in the rain, so I spend another day navigating from inside the cabin.  While on the way to Georgetown we crossed the 2000 mile mark since starting our adventure in September, logging 2053 miles when we reached Georgetown.  Georgetown is a quaint town with a nice boardwalk along the waterfront and many stores, museums, restaurants, and shops along the main street.  The rain let up soon after we arrived and we had a nice bright rainbow over the town.

We were planning to go from Georgetown to North Myrtle Beach the next day, but when we got up in the morning it was cold, windy, and raining, so we decided not to rush off.  The rain eventually stopped, so we decided to go ahead.  The wind was a little rough starting out, but as we progressed up the river and into the ICW the effects became less and I was able to navigate from the flybridge.  This was the day that we had to navigate the infamous "Rock Pile" section of the ICW near Myrtle Beach.   On the way down in the Fall, the water was quite high due to extensive rain the previous two or three weeks so the Rock Pile was not an issue.  This time water levels were more normal so we could see rock ledges on each side of the narrow channel.  Luckily there was a sports fisherman boat in front of us that just blasted through the critical Rock Pile miles, so I just followed him. We stopped for the night in North Myrtle Beach at Coquina harbor.

From North Myrtle Beach we went to Southport, NC.  While it was still quite windy but the wind was not an issue in the IWC canals and cuts, but when leaving Southport the next several miles are on the Cape Fear River, which is a very large body of water and the wind and current can whip up some large waves.  Since winds for the next few days were predicted to be in the 20 to 30 mph category we elected to stay put for the next four days.  My brother Dave and sister-in-law Terri visited from New Bern and stayed on the boat with us until we left. While they were there we rode on the ferry to Fort Fisher and visited the aquarium there.

The night before leaving Southport we attended a weather and navigation briefing given at the marina by Hank Pomeranz of Carolina Yacht Care.  It was very informative and well worth attending.  We got a number of excellent tips about how to navigate shallow areas that we would be transiting in the next few days.  We finally left Southport and headed up the river to our next stop at Sneads Ferry, NC.  There is really nothing there but an overnight stop.  The marinas in the area are very basic, to put it nicely.  While we were on the way up the ICW Dave and Terri were driving home and had stopped at Wrightsville Beach on their way to New Bern and happened to be at the drawbridge there when we passed under.  The bridge tender allowed them to walk out on the catwalk at the tender station, so they were right over the waterway while they took this video.

When we left Sneads Ferry near the New River Inlet we intended to stop in Moorhead City for the night but we made such good time that we were in Moorhead City by 11:30am, so we elected to push on to Fairfield Harbor near New Bern where Dave and Terri live.  This was our next planned stop because Terri was being confirmed, receiving her first Holy communion, and Dave and Terri were having their marriage blessed in the Catholic Church the following weekend.  This resulted in one of our longest days of the trip, logging 86 miles.